f this history was ever written. What it
might have been we can only regretfully conjecture: it has perished with
the uncompleted novel, and all the other dreams of that principle of the
creative intellect which the world calls Ambition, but which the artist
recognizes as Conscience.

That hour of the sunny May-day returns to memory as I write. The quiet
of the library, a little withdrawn from the ceaseless roar of London;
the soft grass of the bit of garden, moist from a recent shower, seen
through the open window; the smoke-strained sunshine, stealing gently
along the wall; and before me the square, massive head, the prematurely
gray hair, the large, clear, sad eyes, the frank, winning mouth, with
its smile of boyish sweetness, of the man whom I honored as a master,
while he gave me the right to love him as a friend. I was to leave the
next day for a temporary home on the Continent, and he was planning how
he could visit me, with his daughters. The proper season, the time, and
the expense were carefully calculated: he described the visit in
advance, with a gay, excursive fancy; and his last words, as he gave me
the warm, strong hand I was never again to press, were, "_Auf
wiedersehen_!"

What little I have ventured to relate gives but a fragmentary image of
the man whom I knew. I cannot describe him as the faithful son, the
tender father, the true friend, the man of large humanity and lofty
honesty he really was, without stepping too far within the sacred circle
of his domestic life. To me, there was no inconsistency in his nature.
Where the careless reader may see only the cynic and the relentless
satirist, I recognize his unquenchable scorn of human meanness and
duplicity,--the impatient wrath of a soul too frequently disappointed in
its search for good. I have heard him lash the faults of others with an
indignant sorrow which brought the tears to his eyes. For this reason he
could not bear that ignorant homage should be given to men really
unworthy of it. He said to me, once, speaking of a critic who blamed the
scarcity of noble and lovable character in his novels,--"Other men can
do that. I know what I can do best; and if I do good, it must be in my
own way."

The fate which took him from us was one which he had anticipated. He
often said that his time was short, that he could not certainly reckon
on many more years of life, and that his end would probably be sudden.
He once spoke of Irving's death as fortunate